The invention relates to a reclining chair mechanism which permits the chair to be fully reclined without the top of the back hitting an adjacent wall or other neighboring structure, and in which the back-carrying linkage is locked in its upright position when the ottoman is in its fully retracted position.
In some reclining chairs, as the back is reclined, its upper rear edge is moved substantially rearwardly relative to where the chair base sits on the floor. Accordingly, a significant amount of space, two or three feet in some instances, must be left clear behind the erect chair, so the back can recline without hitting the wall, a lamp, or whatever other structure one might have wanted to have located closely behind the chair.
Others have devised so-called wall-avoiding or wall-proximity recliner chairs. In some, there is a problem that the chair back, due to its cantilevered weight (because it is actually tilted somewhat to the rear even when erect), or as the user leans back on it when the chair is erect, play in the mechanism permits the back to rotate somewhat towards a reclined condition. To some extent, this tendency can be resisted by use of stiff springs on the side linkages located in places where they would need to be resiliently stretched using significant force in order to permit such rotation.